[July 3, 298 AC | Morning | Westeros > Banks of the Green Fork > First Supply Patrol Battalion] The air in the tent was suffocatingly thick.
Soren sat on a wooden chair; at the edge of his vision, three illusory cards flipped slowly.
[Please select one of the following three random white cards.
Validity: 10 days.] [A: Survival Card “Encumbered Lungs (White)”: Slightly reduces movement penalty caused by injuries or illness.] [B: Technique Card “Tongue of the Abandoned Pawn (White)”: When talking to marginal people such as wounded soldiers, criminals, and savages, initial trust is slightly increased, making it easier to trigger their sense of crisis.] [C: Perception Card “Whispers in the Wind (White)”: Increases long-range hearing out of combat.] Soren listened to Cliff’s intermittent muffled groans outside, his eyes locking directly onto Option B.
“Select B.
Replace ‘Basic Staff Technique’.” A poker could snap a brute’s wrist, but right now he needed a tongue that could bind discarded pawns and mountain clansmen together.
[Equipped temporary trait ‘Tongue of the Abandoned Pawn (White)’.
Current trait slots: 4/4.] A faint chill barely passed through his throat when a furious roar exploded outside the tent.
“Out of the way!
Shagga son of Dolf wants to see Soren!” The tent flap was violently yanked open.
Cold wind rushed in, mixed with a thick stench of blood and mutton grease.
Shagga barged heavily into the tent.
A severe slash cut across his leather armor, raw flesh embedded with rusty iron splinters.
Behind him, Timett carried a dripping shortaxe, his single eye gloomy.
Chella held her arms crossed, her face cold as stone, but her beastly eyes evaluated Soren up and down.
Outside the tent stood a dozen mountain clansmen warriors wrapped in filthy bandages.
They had come to collect a debt.
The debt of that grand, impossible promise.
“The Halfman is gone,” Chella spoke first, her voice like a knife scraping bone.
“The red-cloaks told us that starting today, the free men of the mountains take orders from that knight named Marbrand.
Without his command, we cannot leave camp, cannot keep our spoils.” Shagga slammed a broken steel sword heavily onto the desk: “He gave Shagga this!
Scrap metal that can’t even split a sheepskin!” Timett chuckled softly: “We killed for the Halfman, and bled for you.
The Burned Men don’t guard wagons for stranger lowlanders.” The air in the tent dropped to freezing point.
Roland Leyton instinctively gripped his hilt, while Gawen wished he could stuff himself into the parchment.
Soren looked at these hillmen.
They were no longer unfamiliar savages to be casually used; hence this debt weighed heavily.
Shagga stared dead at him: “Soren, does the Halfman’s promise still hold?” [Warning: Host detected in a high-risk commitment node.
Inducing hillmen to launch indiscriminate plundering will lead to a sharp decline in Honor Points.] The system’s cold red text flashed on his retina.
Soren met Shagga’s gaze, his voice steadily composed: “It holds.” Shagga’s eyes lit up, but Chella let out a cold laugh: “He left, how does it hold?” “He went to King’s Landing to sit on the chair that gives orders.
As long as he lives, the Vale of Arryn is no empty promise.” Soren used the subtle resonance of ‘Tongue of the Abandoned Pawn’, infusing his voice with deep resonance: “So you must live too.
Dead men can’t collect debts.” This sentence shut Shagga’s mouth.
Chella narrowed her eyes.
Just then, a young warrior with a fresh blade wound on his left cheek squeezed out from behind Shagga.
“I am Conn.
Gunthor was my brother,” the youth gritted his teeth, eyes red.
“That lowlander with the boar sigil killed him and stole his axe.
You told Shagga not to strike, you said he shouldn’t die in vain…
then when will he NOT have died in vain?!” Soren looked at him, silent for a moment: “Not today.” Conn tightened his grip on his hilt, anger flaring in his eyes.
Soren didn’t waste breath, speaking bluntly: “You go back to the mountains now, steal a few sheep, and then get driven back into stone crevices by Vale knights to starve to death.
If you want the Vale of Arryn, learn the lowlanders’ rules first!” He stared at the chiefs in the tent: “Killing Crakehall today is a personal grudge, a mutiny, giving him a valid excuse to slaughter all of you.
Wait until he reaches out again to steal military grain and sell routes to the enemy—killing him then is military law!” Conn froze.
Chella looked at Soren’s straight back, the arc of her mouth softening slightly.
She realized she kind of liked the ruthless streak in this lowlander.
Timett gently licked the blood off his axe edge: “Lowlanders’ grudges must also be written in ledgers first?” “Yes,” Soren said.
“Write it clearly, calculate it thoroughly, then claim it back with interest.” Shagga stared at Soren for a long time.
Finally, he grinned, showing coarse yellow teeth: “Shagga still wants to chop him now.” “I know,” Soren replied calmly.
“But dead men can’t collect debts.” Shagga snorted heavily, finally tossing the broken sword onto the ground and drawing his battleaxe.
Chella turned to look at the clansmen behind her, saying coldly: “Black Ears follow me to Marbrand.
I want to see if that lowlander knight lies even better than the Halfman.” Timett touched his empty eye socket: “Burned Men go check the steel.” He paused, randomly picking two young warriors covered in burn scars behind him: “These two stay with you.
One hurt his leg, one’s head is broken.
Marbrand won’t like them.” The two disfigured Burned Men warriors grinned.
Shagga also picked Conn and three others from the Stone Crows: “They don’t obey, they’ll chop people if they go, keep them with you.” Chella thought for a moment, leaving behind a few wounded Black Ears and two scouts skilled at climbing trees.
In the end, seventeen mountain clansmen remained beside Soren’s supply battalion.
Roland Leyton looked at this group of reeking, bloodstained hillmen, his voice dry: “My lord, the Quartermaster won’t like this.” “The Quartermaster already dislikes me,” Soren looked at the grain wagons being reorganized.
“Rotten soldiers, rotten grain, rotten accounts, rotten debts.
This is the first piece of turf Tywin left me.” The chiefs prepared to leave.
As Chella passed Soren, she suddenly stopped.
She reached out and grabbed Soren’s chin, like inspecting a strong mountain beast freshly pulled from a pitfall.
Her fingers were rough, smelling of leather, ash, and dried blood.
“Lowlander chiefs lied to mountain tribes before.
You’d better not become like them,” Chella narrowed her eyes, her gaze unapologetically appreciative.
“Though you spoke like a chief today.
Not a slick-tongued chief like the Halfman, but a chief who can make men put their blades away.” She punched Soren’s bandage-wrapped chest with moderate force.
“Bones are tough enough too.” That punch made Soren’s ribs throb painfully.
Chella grinned, revealing white teeth: “Don’t die at Aspen Ford.
Black Ears women don’t like good studs getting their eyes pecked out by crows.” With that, she turned to catch up with her tribe, the few blackened human ear pendants in her tangled hair swaying gently in the cold wind.
Soren stood in place, chest still aching, his mind oddly stalling for a moment.
Shae’s appreciation was like honey—sweet yet toxic; Chella’s appreciation was like a punch—rude yet genuine.
He mentally glanced at his pathetic [10 Charisma]—with just this much Charisma, he was actually evaluated by a female chief holding his chin, called “tough boned.” If it ever grew to 20 or 30 points, wouldn’t he be dragged back to mountain caves by wildling women, dancing around him and campfires?
Soren twitched the corner of his mouth.
Forget it, he hadn’t even dispatched a wagon of moldy wheat yet, how could he worry about that.
He put away his thoughts and turned to the seventeen remaining hillmen.
“Listen up.
You’re not here to be pushcart coolies.” Soren pointed to the convoy being assembled in camp, his voice kept very low, yet infused with bone-chilling murder.
“The dozen-plus wagons on the outermost edge are filled with moldy wheat mixed with sand.
Someone wants this set of fake accounts burned at Aspen Ford, while burying me along with it.” Conn gripped his knife tightly: “Who?
Northerners?” “No, wild dogs hired by ‘big figures’ on our side,” Soren’s gaze passed over these fierce stragglers.
“When we set out later, the two scouts skilled in climbing trees will disperse into the woods on both sides, watching the eyes along the route for me.” “The rest of you, hide inside the empty wagon beds covered with thick tarpaulins in the middle of the convoy.” The two Burned Men lunatics grinned; they liked nothing more than stabbing from the shadows.
“Remember,” Soren looked at them, “when the raiders rush out thinking they can finish the job by cutting down a few old and weak, you throw off the tarpaulins.
I want the leader alive to audit the accounts.
As for the iron armor on their bodies and the fine steel swords in their hands…” The blood vessels in Conn’s eyes glowed bright red.
“They are all yours,” Soren said coldly.
The hillmen’s breathing instantly grew heavy.
No one understood what a hunting bait was better than them.
…
Half an hour later, the First Supply Patrol Battalion officially set out.
It was a ridiculously comedic column.
At the very front were thirty-some creaking, broken grain wagons loaded with sandy, moldy wheat; walking along the sides were weak, old Westerlands stragglers leaning on wooden sticks.
In the center of the column, inside the empty wagon beds tightly covered with heavy tarpaulins, seventeen blood-soaked, wolf-eyed mountain brutes quietly gripped their axes and broken swords, waiting for their prey to bite.
Gawen clutched his ledger, shivering as he walked, while Roland Leyton rode an old horse with a complex expression.
“Commander, harboring these wounded and troublemakers can easily be written as ‘harboring bandits’ in military law.” “Then let the ones writing the law inspect their own ledgers first,” Soren said faintly.
He looked toward the fog ahead.
In the direction of Aspen Ford, the woods, shoals, and abandoned villages were all hidden in the grayish-white morning light.
The funeral Young Crakehall prepared for him was right there.
Soren tightened his reins, a flash of cold mockery glinting in his eyes.
Tywin dumped him into a mud pit.
Yet forgot that some things are born to grow out of the mud.